The fantasy of another place and time is merely a freeway away when the Renaissance Pleasure Faire opens at the Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area in Irwindale on Saturday. Visitors to the event can enjoy watching jousting, musicians and dancers, artists at work and more, but they can also actively participate in their adventure.

“We get an audience that doesn’t just pay to come see us, they actually pay, many of them, not all of them, to come to see us and potentially be brought into our reality,” said Jeffrey Gray of Claremont, a member of the guild of the Florentines of San Lorenzo at the festival. “We provide a departure from everything that they’re used to in their everyday life. We are the ultimate escape from reality.”

Gray plays the fictional, but historically plausible doctor Don Salvatore Giovanni de Malatesti, whose services are dedicated to the House of the d’Medici. The d’Medici was a wealthy and powerful family that really existed during the Renaissance.

Gray’s guild portrays a group of wealthy, noble Italians visiting Port Deptford, the setting of the faire, during its festivities celebrating Queen Elizabeth. San Lorenzo’s leader is also interested in courting the young queen.

“We are very proud, we are very pretty, our costumes are very fancy and we carry ourselves very formally,” Gray said.

This is the second season for Gray in the Italian guild and his 10th year participating in the faire. Previously he was a monger (street merchant) vending ragged clothing as part of the membership of St. Swithins’ Guild.

Gray encourages visitors to the Renaissance Faire not to be afraid to interact with the shire’s residents, including the seemingly haughty Italians — they’re actually quite friendly.

“If you’re really going to have the best time possible you’re going to do a certain degree of performing yourself. Don’t worry about the quality of that performance, just worry about having it be fun,” Gray said.

Michelle Mills has been an entertainment and features reporter for the Southern California News Group since 1999. She has interviewed such notables as "Weird Al" Yankovic, Glen Campbell, Alice Cooper, Debbie Allen, Ernest Borgnine (during an earthquake) and Adam Young (Owl City). She was the 31st Occasional Pasadena Doo Dah Parade Queen reigning 2007-2009. She is a professional belly dancer (swordwork is her specialty) and also studies Polynesian and Tahitian dance.

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